Every year we track and report on gender diversity in the UK energy industry.
In 2024, POWERful Women’s 10th anniversary year, we have collaborated with Bain & Company to gather and publish statistics on the number of women in board (executive and non-executive), leadership and middle management roles within the top 80 energy companies in the UK, focussing on the most significant employers.
This shows how much progress the sector and individual companies are making towards our 40% target for female representation, and beyond to gender parity, and provides positive recommendations for action.
Below we present the outcome of our 2024 Annual State of the Nation report.
2024 vs 2023 average representation of women in board, leadership and middle management
“This year’s data paints a disappointing picture of how few women there still are in key decision-making roles on the boards of the UK’s energy sector, with progress stalling in the last 12 months. We do see a welcome rise in the number of women represented in the leadership pipeline and the sector is on track to meet POWERful Women’s target of 40% of these roles by 2030. But more needs to be done to improve female representation, particularly among the 20% of energy companies who, shockingly, have no women on their boards at all.
As we mark our 10th anniversary, POWERful Women can celebrate the progress that’s been made since 2014, when women occupied just 9% of all energy board seats and 5% of the executive director roles. Our analysis shows that it’s possible to achieve gender parity, with leaders already paving the way.”
– Katie Jackson, Chair, POWERful Women
“Though there is much to celebrate in terms of gender diversity efforts in the UK energy sector, the statistics show that we are clearly not moving fast enough – and need to find a way to accelerate progress.
At Bain, our research and client work suggests that each company needs an actionable blueprint on DEI, which includes a bold ambition with measurable targets and sustained leadership commitment, alongside investment in critical enablers such as governance and resourcing, technology and data. Perhaps most importantly though, companies need to go beyond representation alone and truly focus on creating an inclusive organisation, as inclusion is one of the most powerful levers for both employee experience and business performance”.
– Olga Muscat, Partner at Bain & Company and head of the firm’s UK Utilities Practice
WHY REPORT THIS DATA?
Publication of the annual statistics is an important part of POWERful Women’s work to challenge the sector on its gender diversity
Gathering, monitoring and reporting data provides transparency and drives tangible progress towards diversity targets – “what gets measured gets managed”
This exercise is part of the constructive support PfW provides to UK energy companies, such as the Energy Leaders’ Coalition, in setting clear expectations and encouraging ambition and action, through sharing good practice and facilitating discussion.
We would like to thank Bain & Company their support for our Annual State of the Nation data analysis. We are grateful to all the companies and stakeholders who have provided input and who are working hard to improve their gender balance within their own organisations and in the energy sector as a whole.
